Canary Readers Split on Mahanoy Area Cheer Case Headed to SCOTUS

A little while back, we asked our great readers who they believe the Supreme Court of the United States should rule in favor of in the case of Mahanoy Area School District v. BL.

The case is headed to SCOTUS soon after the high court agreed to hear it.

• READ: Supreme Court Will Hear Mahanoy Area Cheerleading First Amendment Case

And they’ll ultimately decide if school administrators were justified in suspending a high school student, known as BL in the lawsuit, after she posted an explicit critical message, in part, about Mahanoy Area’s cheerleading program.

BL’s defense is that she wasn’t on school grounds and not dressed in Mahanoy Area attire when she posted that infamous message to Snapchat, therefore she’s immune from school punishment.

The case will ultimately draw a line, or not, on what students can post on social media and if it has any bearing on their school participation.

We asked our readers who they thought the Supreme Court would favor in this case: BL or Mahanoy Area?

We’ve failed to formulate a firm on this case. And it appears our readers are just as divided. About 100 readers responded – pretty much a record for one of our reader polls – and the split was nearly even.

Canary Readers Split on Mahanoy Area v. BL

But before we reveal who did come out victorious in our latest Canary Reader Survey, let’s first talk about reader participation.

The article with the poll included was read several thousand times while the poll was active. Out of those several thousand people, only 98 responded. Just 98.

This wasn’t a particularly tricky poll. There were just 2 choices.

Now, either our readers just couldn’t decide …

Or it was more like our readers weren’t into answering surveys …

Sorry for the lecture. And thanks to the 98 readers who took the extra half-second to click or tap one of the corresponding boxes on the survey question.

The Results

We didn’t send these results to Germany. They were counted in a single night. And we didn’t run out of ballots.

And when the votes were tallied, more Canary readers favored Mahanoy Area School District over BL in this case:

The vote totals:

• 52 – Mahanoy Area 
• 46 – BL